The Shear Joy of It

I am sixteen. It’s my birthday and my mother hands me a wrapped package. I tug at the curled ribbon, coaxing it to a corner so I can slide it off, but the knot is too tight, unwilling to budge. She hands me a knife and I release it, the ribbon falling to the floor. I pull away the wrapping paper to reveal a 12 x 9 inch gray box with the name Fiskar plastered across the front in white.

I am puzzled. “I thought I was getting that black velvet blazer at Bambergers.”

She shakes her head. “No, this is better. Look inside.”

Inside are four scissors with handles the color of ripe tangerines. The stainless steel blades glisten in the kitchen’s sunlight. I try to hide my frustration. I had planned on wearing that blazer to a party that night.

She pulls out the largest scissor from the box. “These are pinking shears.” She places it back in its allotted space and shows me another. With a loud snip, snip, she says, “Fabric shears should be used for fabric only.” She sets it aside and holds up a small implement with two blades, sharp and pointy like alligator teeth. “No sense learning to sew without a pair of thread snips to rip out mistakes.” She nods at the last pair. “Embroidery scissors for finer work.”

She gives me another bag. I pull out velvet cloth black as night and rub my hand over it. “It’s so so soft,” I say. “Like a kitten.”

“It’s silk velvet. The best they make. From Italy. One more thing,” she says and hands me a large paper envelope.

On the front it says Simplicity 5212. My eyes immediately hone in on the woman in a blazer and maxi skirt. “My blazer.”

She smiles. “It’s tapered in the front and back and has slashed pockets, like the one we saw. It has four buttons instead of three, but I think it pulls in nicer at the waist like that.”

“Do you think we can make it?” I ask, unconvinced.

Of course,” she says. Her face turns stern. “Invest in high-quality tools if you want to create high-quality items. These scissors cut fabric like a knife through butter. They’ll last a lifetime if you treat them right. Don’t use them to cut paper or hair. It’ll dull the blades. Remember that.”

Interested now, I nod.

**

It took us several months to make that blazer, and the seam ripper got used way more than the shears; that’s for sure. One pocket was a little crooked, and the collar turned out a little wonky, but I wore that blazer with pride.

The blazer is long gone. Most likely donated to Goodwill, but that project sparked my interest in sewing for many, many years to come. Every time I pulled out my box of scissors to start a new sewing project, I’d think of her—my mother. But as life got busier with kids and work and a house and yard, my sewing projects dwindled.

Sometimes it felt like I was just surviving, keeping up with what needed to be done. Creative pursuits? They’d long died.

**

I am in my 60s now. I sit on my favorite, worn-out, couch. The flowers on the fabric are fading and the arms are threadbare in spots. But it’s a comfortable couch with roomy, down-filled cushions. It’s the kind of sofa you sink into at the end of the day and it envelops you. They don’t make sofas like this anymore. I can’t bear to throw it out.

I decide to make new slipcovers even though I haven’t sewn in years. I order a mishmash of fabric online—yards of this, yards of that—all in compatible and contrasting colors, textures, and patterns. Bolts of fabric arrive and I open them like a kid at a birthday party, oohing and ahhing over the vibrant, mouthwatering colors—mustard, butterscotch, caramel, toffee and sun-shine yellow. I bring them in the sunroom and unroll them, placing patterns next to patterns, rearranging until I get it just right.

I go to the armoire and get my Fiskar scissors. I pull the old slipcover off the couch and snip apart the seams until dismantled, couch pieces covering the terracotta floor. I doubt myself. Shouldn’t I have labeled them or taken pictures, done something organized or halfway intelligent? Now, I have no idea which pieces go together. All I have is a big mess on my hands.

It brings me back to the day I cut out the velvet fabric with my mother. As we sat on the carpet with tissue paper pattern pieces scattered around us, I must have looked beaten and confused. I remember her words: “Sometimes you just have to push through to get to the other side.”

So I shear. Using the old couch pieces as patterns, I lay them on top of the new fabric until each piece has a matching partner, old with new. The scissors glide through the fabric with precision and I put everything in a pile. I set up my sewing machine and begin to baste the new pieces together. I hold it up. This can’t possibly be right. Did I sew a piece of the right arm to part of the left arm?

I remember my mother’s advice when she handed me the seam ripper for the first time. “Mistakes don’t need to be permanent. Rip it out and start over.” So I do. I start with the cushions and whittle my way down until things start to make sense.

Finally, I have it pieced together and put it over the couch, tucking here, pulling there. It needs some alterations; but all in all, I’m pretty proud of my handiwork. I snuggle into the couch and it caresses and comforts me like an old, familiar hug. How did I pull this off, I wonder? But I know the answer. I gaze upward and thank my mother